A 31-year-old Odessa man was arrested early Tuesday morning two days after a Valero gas station clerk said he robbed her at gunpoint.
According to an Odessa Police Department report, a man wearing a black do-rag over his face and hair stole $821 out of the cash register of an East Eighth Street Valero at 3:45 a.m. Sunday while armed with a gun and after ordering the 20-year-old clerk not to look at him.
The clerk told officers the suspect had a State of Texas tattoo on his forearm and he’d arrived at the store from a neighboring street.
Roughly 48 hours later, an officer found a Ford Escape matching the description of the suspect’s vehicle outside a room at the Odessa Motor Inn on East Second Street and when the officer spoke with the room’s occupant, Tristan Ward, he noticed a State of Texas tattoo on his right forearm, according to the report.
Officers found a 9 mm handgun, black do-rag and clothes matching the robbery suspect’s clothing in the motel room, the report stated.
Investigators spoke with the store clerk again and she told them she thought the robbery suspect was a regular customer and she’d seen him in the store around 4 p.m. Monday, the report stated. She’d taken a photo of his Ford and made note of its license plate.
One of the officers investigating the robbery remembered the suspect in a June Eighth Street Whataburger robbery was also a left-handed black man who had arrived from a neighboring street and had fled in a vehicle left nearby, the report stated.
When the officers served the search warrant on Ward’s room, they found shoes matching the description of the suspect’s shoes from the Whataburger robbery, the report stated.
Ward was arrested on suspicion of two counts of aggravated robbery, a first-degree felony punishable by five years to life in prison. He’s also being held on a first-degree felony drug charge.
Ward remains in custody on a U.S. Marshal’s hold and surety bonds totaling $280,000.
